8 1/2 may the best film ever made.
If not, it is the best film about art ever made. Released in 1963, it would have been as relevant in 1889, the year after ROUNDHAY GARDEN SCENE, as it would be if it premiered tomorrow. It's a film that encompasses everything that art is about, or at least is supposed to be about. It's about the tension between truth and fiction, between art and commerce, between awareness and narcissism. And it's about everything that life is about. It's about commitment and betrayal, about memory and currency, reality and fantasy. It's about who we are and who we want to be, about ourselves and our self-constructs. It is, simply put, magnificent. It is the apotheosis of film and the indictment of the thin gruel we, as filmgoers, so regularly accept.
OK, so that's what it looks like when my mind is blown.
But this feels like a film I could see a thousand times. Not only is it a multisensual feast, but it probes, really probes, into the beating heart of life in a way no film I'd previously seen ever has. The photography complements the music complements the finely crafted story complements the performances complements the ideas that form the core of the work. 8 1/2 reveals Fellini at the height of his power, grappling with elemental dilemmas that have confronted man since he became self-aware. Mastroianni is incomparable. Cardinale and Aimée are revelatory. Every single thing about this picture is perfect. My only regret is that I've waited this long to see it.
